Most Secret War

by R.V. Jones

The next step in the disciplinary process was to overawe me with the Official Secrets Act. I was shown the Laboratory copy of the Act and asked to sign a certificate to the effect that I had read the Official Secrets Act (1911) and understood it. I could not resist adding a postscript to my signature: ‘The 1920 Act is also worth reading.’ Actually, having been interested in official secrets I had some time before purchased from the Stationery Office copies of both Acts to see how they applied to my work and to anyone who might try to reveal it. It was almost incredible that the security authorities in the Admiralty had not been aware of the later Act, and I awaited results. The certificate was duly taken back to the Laboratory office and a little later a despatch rider was sent up to the Admiralty to check whether there really was an Act in 1920.